Treasure Coast coaches and athletic directors are embracing the Florida High School Athletic Association’s decision to allow teams to practice this week, including Sunday.

The FHSAA released a bulletin late Tuesday afternoon, informing member schools that they can practice and play games this week as long as the school district approves it.
Indian River, Martin and St. Lucie county schools are closed until Monday because of Hurricane Irma.

“I don’t see anything wrong with trying to get with your players together and trying to figure out what’s up and what’s down,” Vero Beach High School athletic director/football coach Lenny Jankowski said. “I was worried about my players, just trying to see who had power and who didn’t.

“We’ll try to do some stuff. We’ll try to have some stability. We have some players and coaches that have evacuated and are still trying to make their way back. We’ll try to keep some kind of normalcy going.”

The FHSAA rarely allows Sunday activities, but made a one-time exception for this week to help teams get "conditioned appropriately."

Martin County athletic director Mark Cowles echoed Jankowski’s statements and said he would “be open” to the Tigers practicing Sunday.

“We’ll talk to (football) coach (Bill) Cubit and our other coaches, but I think it would be good to get them together — even if it’s just running around or stretching. Just them being around each other again, I think it would be huge for all of us.”

While it looks like schools in Indian River and Martin County will be practicing, St. Lucie County schools will not.

“We were told there are no games or practices by our principals until Monday,” St. Lucie County athletic director Jill Willette said.

The FHSAA plans no changes to the original football schedule "in an effort to cause the least amount of impact on all other non-athletic activities." There had been questions about pushing the end of the regular season back one week in order to make up more games.